Bezman's movie Reviews on Newgrounds

["24 Seconds" episode 3]

I'm SO HAPPY you released it!

I was honestly wondering what had happened to the series. YOU LEFT US IN THE COLD, man!

Seriously though, you should have mentioned you'll be submitting 2 a day. I'd forgotten about the limit.

I was gripped as it was loading, desperate to know what would happen... would we find out what disease it was called?

I can't actually make out the last line in the cartoon. After he says, "Well, it's called...". I get the gist from the next episode, but the speech is slightly unintelligible.

I think optional subtitles would have been a nice touch.

Animation is almost non-existent. (just mouths)

Art is poor.

But it's kinda appealing in an off-the-cuff way.

It's just a great idea and it's brilliant that you actually did it.

Even so, this is the weakest episode of the 4 so far, I think.

[How to make a sandwich!]

Joyfully executed. But what's that song? Seriously

It's a simple idea but the loveliness lies in the execution. The perfectly fitting music, the simple graphics, the lively motion with flecks of tomato and ham bouncing off...

I was hoping the 'bonus' would be more than just a quick replay of the movie. Also, I was disappointed not to see the face from the thumbnail.

I'm not too keen on the way you can quickly skip backwards but not forwards. (Skipping forwards requires you to watch the whole clips, even if it's for the 2nd or 3rd time...)

Lastly, you should have credited the music. What is that song? Seriously, I wanna know. And some ending credits might have been nice too. Just to give it some sort of closure.

I suppose you could have mebbe also had some quick animations of a knife cutting up the ingredients, but it's nice as it is.

The idea's one that would be made or broken by the quality of presentation.

You did a cracking job.

But seriously, what's that song?

[Service Announcement]

Voice a bit hard to make out.

- HypOthetical, not 'hypathetical'.

I like the shading on on Ratbag, as well as the lip synching and the way he grasps the screenshots.

Some of the speech is a bit hard to understand.

The text on the 'play again' button is too thin, considering the size you show it at.

The message itself doesn't come across too well, specially as you're meshing two seperate messages into one long (slightly unintelligible) rant.

Firstly, you're telling us all to vote. Secondly, you're asking folk to use proper judgement. Personally, I definitely agree with the 2nd point, but not really the 1st.

It's not so much that I disagree with the sentiment. (Though I'd rather folk didn't vote at all than voted when they had closed the window prematurely.) More that I just don't think it makes that much difference in the long run. And the folk who see this will most likely vote anyway. The ratio's always going to be lower for more popular front-paged stuff, as that's what the folk who come in, watch a few/play a few things, then leave without really thinking much about Newgrounds, never mind the contributers or the voting system, will tend to see.

And regarding reviews - yeah, I love reviews. I always say so in my author's comments and try to respond to them all.

But when an author quite probably won't give a toss about the thoughts and constructive criticism I've offered, there's not much point in giving them.

That's my £0.02

stoners-lunchbox responds:

Indeed, i spelt the word wrong... But since i'm from Italy and not from America a mere spelling mistake like that shouldn't set me back too much...

As for the play again button... I'll make the text larger, but really, unless you'd find it hard to ckick does it HAVE to be a flaw?

Voting and revieweing... if i didn't think that it it needed saying... i wouldn't have said it... If i said it slow the "target audience" would've equally not given a shit... and thanks for agreeing on at least ONE of my points that i made in the film...

The author always cares. The author simply gets pissed off about bad criticism ("fuck opff and die"... "you suck"... "eat a penis"... "get a life"... do i have to name more?). Two line insults are what people classify as reviews nowdays... And the funny thing is that "front page submissions" get it too... from insensible morons who can't judge.

Authors do it too every now and then when they rebuttle... But that shouldn't discourage you. I answer to every review in the same manner the reviewers write to me to start with (rational if it's rational and like an asshole if it's written by an asshole) and i make sure that i answer back to every review on my submissions. I return the courtesy and i think it's what everyone should do. I have a life as well... Year 12, TAFE, work, Newgrounds, my family, my girl... like everyone would around here... But since that doesn't stop me from doing what's right it shouldn't stop anyone else...

Anyway, i'll try to fix the flaws by the next submission. Thanks for the feedback!

[Story Tag 1]

Made me chuckle a bit. Lovely, sweet ending.

The idea is one that I've wanted to do myself for a while but haven't for lack of organisation and others to do it with. When I was thinking about it though, I wanted to do it with many folk each doing only 1 bit.

Anyway, the review...

Overall, it was amusing, made me chuckle and had seamless transitions. The presentation was lovely and I admired the way you made the in-movie credits come up on 2nd viewing.

Both of you seem to have a vast magnitude of ideas and talent at your disposal, something that really comes across here.

I liked your little easter egg, and the 'I'm dead' bit. I did find, though, that on some presses, some frames of the lip animation would be skipped for some reason. He would pucker his lips on 'like' and his lips would stop moving on the 'k' of 'like'. That only happened in later scenes and seemed to happen consistently in those scenes for me.

The 'normal' - non-easter-egg utterances were lip-synched perfectly.

The progression of the story seemed logical (within its own logic if you see what I mean) and I really like the fact that there seems to be no conflict between your storytelling. It's astonishing how well the whole thing gels together (pun not intended, if you call that a pun).

The quality of animation is not nearly as high as some of your other pieces (both of you) but it seems you had fun making it and it shows through. It's certainly more than functional and has its own positive attributes.

The story itself - I really enjoyed. To start with, the random violence did make me chuckle a tiny bit as a sorta non-sequitar with the pleasant scene. The passage of time became increasingly absurd and just when I thought 'it's all gonna fall apart at the end', you brought it all together wonderfully, making a rather sweet ending of a slightly macabre tale.

Is that Dustball's voice?

I like the short sequence of music notes at the end and the presentation seemed nice and cheerful too.

[KILLZ-OWN]

Made me smile at the end.

Ist view opinions:

I like the way you contrast the brutality of the war with the comedy of the short spiel.

Graphics may not have been much to speak of, but they were at least functional and had a certain charm.

From the start:

Opening screen looks like crap.

I like the stretch as the guy jumps out of the ship.

The way the text is revealed is also nice.

I do like the gun lighting effects.

Smoke at the end of the war scene could be better.

It took me ages to work out he was saying 'toilet seat'. It sounds like 'totsee' or something. I thought it was a crazy American word.

Overall, it made me smile at the end.

Fairly short and too the point.

Though the style is intentionally simplistic, you've worked with the style well.

Only real complaints: slightly lacking graphics (didn't bother me, but wouldn't have hurt) the near incomprehensible (for me) 'toilet seat) and that I could kinda see where the conversation was going.

Personally, I think all movies with speech or lyrics of any importance at all should have optional subtitles.

Stay funky,
- Bez

[Happy-lanD]

That's fucking awesome!

Seriously! I don't care about the poor graphics or the short length or lack of meaning because...

It made me smile and laugh! It made me feel happy!

I salute you sir.

I really liked the way you have the night come on before the day starts again.

Boingy, boingy boing! I love bouncy things!

So are some of them having sexx?

Too short?

Nah, it's probably the perfect length. Any longer'd be boring maybe. If you've got a short idea, why make it needlessly long?

I salute you sir.

Brilliant work.

[The Ant King 2]

Was that meant to be funny?

The cheese thing didn't make me giggle. It just seemed as if you were trying to create a serious atmosphere and failed, rather than the humour being intentional.

It just seemed incongruous and a bit silly.

The girls were drawn OK. Most other art was a bit shit tbh. The animation was all pretty poor. For mouth movements, use different shapes. Don't just change the size.

The art seemed suitable for a comedy and the audio/cutting for an action B-movie.

But it just didn't work it my eyes.

Mebbe try for a comedy or something next. If you've got a decent joke, the artwork plays less of a part.

[The Morning Show Intro]

It's a great intro.

But I just don't see the point of putting something like that in the portal.

I was expecting something of a prologue here...

I take it the morning show was a broadcast (live action) thing then?

Even more, I'm amazed it's gottten such a high score.

Well, it is a funky intro...

I like it all. Nicely timed, fast paced and decent gfx with nice music too.

Not really worthy of the portal though imo.